Rial a frozen artifact

The rial remains a frozen artifact with no real market on which to judge its value for a full full month now.

The last open market rate to be published on the Internet by the Mesghal firm that queries foreign exchange houses every few hours on prices was 35,800 rials to the dollar on October 2.  After that, the government intervened, forcing the posting of a mythical price of 28,500 rials per dollar for three days.  Since them, price posting has ended.

Mesghal, Mazanex and DataLine, three websites all publishing prices, have all gone silent on the dollar.  They carry other prices, such as for gold, but there are no US dollar figures posted anymore.

The government is also trying to suppress the black market.  Intelligence Minister Heydar Moslehi last week said that more than 50 dealers gave been arrested and charged with cooperating with the country’s enemies to disrupt the currency and feed economic instability.

That is not, however, a large increase over the 46 black marketeers he said had been arrested as of the first week of October.  That suggests the black market may have been successfully suppressed by the regime—at least for now.

Legal open market currency dealers generally report they have no dollars to sell, though other currencies are available.